you are correct - 1st one is blurred, or rather not focused - at least 1pixel out on this small sized image.
Go try FocusMagic (trial) and just see what it does for you - I use it all the time
hey - like the photos!!

I think both are reasonably good compositions, but the pictures both lack something. What,exactly is missing, is hard to define. It seems to me that the rendering of the lighting is not quite right; I think maybe the shadows are too dark,and the contrast is not *quite* right,not quite *believable* in the mid tones and lower midtone areas, just above the shadow values.

We see so much fine architectural photography that we've become used to being treated to amazing HDR renderings, done invisibly, that these two shots do not quite make the scene look real, look believable.

My guess is that the tone curve (contrast) is too steep; the highlights are pegged correctly,and the recessed lights are rendered quite well, but the rest of the lower tonal values block up and get compressed. Maybe you could try moving the black point up and re-adjusting the curves a bit,and make these almost perfect renderings. Compositionally, they are quite good.